Praise them or taser them? Here are my ideas

May 10, 2010

It goes from the men and women who fight to keep our country safe to some 16-year-old asking a girl out on a date.

People all over the world fight cancer, or some other terrible disease which they didn't ask for.

Firefighters run into burning buildings (anyone remember Sept. 11, 2001?) while others run out and policemen patrol some of the most dangerous streets in the world.

Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in baseball.

Mother Theresa was about everyone else.

Muhammad Ali, then Cassius Clay, bucked the system and went to jail.

Pat Tillman left the NFL and went to war and lost his life.

Nelson Mandela spent 27 years in jail for no reason.

Neil Armstrong walked on the moon.

Rosa Parks sat in the front of the bus.

It takes courage to stand up for what you believe in, regardless of the outpouring of emotion and debate.

Golfer Grant Whybark recently did that.

Although not on the same level of those mentioned above, Whybark did what he thought, in his heart, was right and the kid is getting tasered for it.

PRAISE: Whybark, a sophomore at the University of St. Francis, was going to play in the NAIA national championships because his team had just won the Chicagoland Collegiate Athletic Conference Championship, but was in a playoff against Olivet Nazarene's Seth Doran for individual honors.

When Whybark found out before the playoff that Doran had to win the playoff to advance to the national championships, he knew what he had to do and it was a simple decision for him.

He stepped up and jacked his tee shot out of bounds. On purpose.

He made 6. Doran made 4 and both were heading to nationals, May 18-21 at TPC at Deere Park in Silvis, Ill., site of the PGA Tour's John Deere Classic.

I don't want to hear about "integrity of the game" and how Whybark "cheated the game and everyone else who was in the tournament."

Stop already.

Whybark did the honorable thing.

Sportsmanship at its best.

It has been said forever that golf is a gentleman's game.

Whybark did the gentlemanly thing.

I've listened to people say that Whybark should have just missed a putt on purpose and kept everything to himself and no one would have known better.

Yeah, right.

Oh, I see, pulling a 5-iron from 150 yards out and rifling it over the green would have been much better.

Pulling a Tin Cup would have been much better?

Missing a putt on purpose or showing a sudden case of the yips would have been much better?

Tell me, dads, if Whybark was your son, you would have said what?

"Son, you win at all costs."

Then, you are now "that" dad.

Congratulations to Whybark for doing the right thing.

TASER: The 17-year-old who ran onto the baseball field in Philadelphia was tasered by a police officer.

Some people said that was too harsh.

I say taser him again just to make sure he doesn't do it again.

After that, taser his dad for allowing his idiot son to run onto the field.

Reports say the kid called his father and asked for his permission and the dad retorted something along the lines that he didn't think it was the best of ideas.

Really?

Dad, just tell him "No, son, that may be the stupidest thing you've ever thought of."

Instead, his dad told the Philadelphia Daily News, "I don't recommend running on the field, but I don't think they should have Tased him at all."

I know, stay off the field and you won't get tasered.

Sounds easy enough to me.

By the way, quit making excuses for your kid when he is wrong.

TASER: Apparently all the hulabaloo surround the tasering didn't mean much because a 34-year-old did the same thing the next night.

I guess all this excessive force talk meant nothing to this idiot.

He should have been tasered, too.

PRAISE: Four students at Live Oak High School in Gilroy, Calif., wore T-shirts to school adorned with the United States flag.

Daniel Galli, Austin Carvalho, Matt Dariano and Dominic Maciel were sent home from school Wednesday because they were wearing American flag T-shirts on Cinco de Mayo.

According to a report in the Gilroy Dispatch, one student said Vice Principal Miguel Rodriguez called the T-shirts "incendiary."

This too-politically correct world has gone too far when students in the United States are sent home from school because they wore American flag T-shirts, regardless of what day.

TASER: Los Suns.

Really? Los Suns.

If you are going to make a statement against an immigration law that more than 70 percent of Arizona citizens voted for, at least get it right and say, Los Sols.

Or, since Phoenix's uniforms just say "Suns" on the front, just use "Sols."

I'm not going to say if it is a good law or a bad law, but if people have not ready every word of the law, how do they know?

TASER: Most professional golfers who withdraw from a tournament.

Tiger did it Sunday with a "bulging disc in his neck." I'm not saying he doesn't have it, but if he had a 5-shot lead with 12 holes to play, would he have packed it in?

No.

Ever see a golfer go 66-WD?

That is beyond rare.

Most golfers go 82-WD, 78-WD, 76-WD, 86-WD.

PRAISE: To the Oakland Raiders for finally dumping JaMarcus Russell, who now officially becomes the biggest bust in the NFL, replacing former No. 1 choice Ryan Leaf.

The guy is a stiff who chose to spend more time looking in the mirror than the playbook.

Nice work ethic there.

(Mathison, a Weirton resident, is the sports editor of the Herald-Star and The Weirton Daily Times and can be contacted at mmathison@heraldstaronline.com)